In The Journal of Regulation the summaries’ translation are done by the Editors and not by the authors

ENGLISH

The Conseil d’Etat (French Council of State) handed down a ruling (n°339154) on October 19, 2011 in the French Data Network, Apple, and iTunes case. In this ruling, it refused to annul the decree giving the "Haute Autorité pour la diffusion des œuvres et la protection des droits sur Internet" (HADOPI — France’s Internet Piracy Regulator) the power to issue injunctions to force the accessibility of essential information on the Internet in order to guarantee interoperability, using either penalties or fines.

On May 12, 2011, both Neelie Kroes, the European Commissioner for the digital agenda within the European Commission, and Larry Strickling, Assistant Commissioner for Communications and Information within the United States Department of Commerce, sent a notification to the ICANN, a private association that manages Internet domain names. First of all, they agreed with the principle of self-regulation of Internet domain names by the ICANN. But, they requested a reform of its “governance” to improve its transparency and better take into account public authorities’ recommendations.

The British Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) announced on September 1st, 2010 a revision to the Committee of Advertising Practice Code (the CAP Code), in order to handle consumer complaints and sanction non-compliant advertising on British websites. These new rules will be effective from March 1st 2011.

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The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announces on May 6, 2010 that it will reclassify broadband Internet service as a Telecommunications Service, in order to overcome the ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on April 6, 2010, which found that the FCC’s approach to network neutrality lacked sufficient legal basis.

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A contract between Free (a French Internet Service Provider) and one of its subscribers contained a clause stipulating that access to audiovisual services was conditional upon the eligibility of the user’s telephone line for such services. The Court of Cassation deems that except in cases of force majeure, such a clause does not exempt the service provider from his strict liability to provide such services

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On April 27, 2010, the European Parliament’s Committee for Health voted to introduce an amendment to the European Commission’s ‘Pharmacovigilance and Prescription Medicine Package’, which would introduce a strict regime for online prescription medicine sellers.

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The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit strikes down a decision that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the American telecommunications regulation agency, had taken against an Internet service provider, on the grounds that the FCC is incompetent to impose the theory of network neutrality on Internet service providers.

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Nomination of the members of the Haute autorité pour la diffusion d’oeuvres et la protection de droits sur Internet (Hadopi – High Authority for the Dissemination of Works and the Protection of Rights on the Internet).